Danny Parker

kdparker@wisc.edu

Danny Parker headshot

Danny Parker is a PhD student at the School of Journalism and Mass Communication at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. A political communication scholar, Danny examines the role communication ecologies play in the development of civic and political identity. A major facet of her research grapples with how structural conditions threaten equal access to democratic institutions and belief in democracy for vulnerable and impoverished communities. A qualitative methodologist and an ethnographer, Danny chronicles the lived experiences of these communities by conducting interviews and participating in their everyday lives. Danny has a professional background in international education and taught English as a second language for seven years before pursuing her PhD. She obtained her bachelor’s degree in applied linguistics from Georgia State University and her master’s degree in journalism and mass communication from the University of Georgia.

When people ask what I do, I tell them that if we think of society as a hierarchy — and imagine it as an architectural structure — then it probably looks a lot different from the bottom looking upward than from the top looking down. My goal is to collaborate with my quantitative colleagues to get a more complete picture of the society we aim to understand. I want to help build a map that will take us to a radically inclusive understanding of political communication.